Russia announced that it has conducted two prisoner exchanges with Ukraine, but Kiev denied it, as it acknowledges only one such episode confirmed on Monday.
The Russian Foreign Ministry reported on Wednesday that, since Russian forces entered Ukraine, two exchanges of Russian-Ukrainian prisoners have been organized, although it did not specify either the dates or how many detainees the operations involved.
“The Russian Ministry of Defense organizes daily humanitarian corridors and the evacuation of civilians from localities. In addition, two prisoner exchanges have taken place between Russia and Ukraine,” the ministry said, without further details, in a statement denouncing the European Union's (EU) positions on Russia and its offensive in the neighbouring country.
But Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshchuk told the BBC that the Russian authorities' statements are not true. “So far, we haven't made any exchanges,” he said.
On Monday, Tatiana Moskalkova, the Kremlin's delegate for human rights, had mentioned an exchange of Russian prisoners in exchange for Ivan Fedorov, the mayor of Melitopol, a Ukrainian city conquered by Russian forces. “The first exchange took place: nine people, some of them are from the list I formed through the calls that come in. I really hope we don't delay with lists, cards, procedures,” he said.
At that conference, Moskalkova noted that Russian forces have captured more than 500 Ukrainian military personnel and that the Red Cross has already sent the respective documentation to facilitate further prisoner exchanges. “These are Ukrainian prisoners that we are willing to exchange,” the official stressed.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov, questioned on this issue on Wednesday, declined to comment.
(With information from AFP)
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